Street Medicine For Homeless Goes Mainstream

Street medicine got its start more than 30 years ago as an altruistic pursuit of individual doctors and nurses. In cities scattered around the country and the world, they left the office and headed outside to care for the chronically homeless, a population that is generally sicker and dies far younger than people with homes.

Until recently, though, relatively few of the 60 street medicine programs that operate nationwide have been affiliated with a hospital or health system. As health networks face increasing pressure to rein in costs, that could change.